PIKE'S LOVE OF COLD WATER. 83
`to my remonstrances he made such ridiculous and im.pössible excuses as are commonly used by Ladakis, asserting that he would certainly make up for lost time by travelling night and day.
Our progress to Rundor was slow and on the way we had difficulties and annoyances to overcome. The weather had become very cold, and when, as on the mornings of October 18th and 19th, the thermometer showed a temperature within 30 of zero F., I was tempted to pay less attention than usual to my ablutions. Pike, however, with the rigour of a Spartan, abated no jot of the morning ceremony. My occasional use of water raised by the camp fire a little above the freezing point,. was regarded by him as a sign of luxurious softness. He was unmoved by accidents of the weather, and when the water was changing to icicles or when only unmelted snow was at hand, he only rubbed the more vigorously. When our tent was so situated as to catch the first rays of the morning sun, a difference of temperature was very perceptible ; but we could not always have this advantage. A trying part of my work was the observation of Collie's portable barometer at seven in the morning and nine in the evening (local tune), an operation in which gloves had to be discarded. In unpacking the instrument, in reading its indications and repeating the readings until three of them agreed to within •004 of an inch, and in again packing up the instrument, a good deal of time was occupied, and my fingers often became so numbed that the work had to be interrupted till the circulation was restored.
Then we had a good deal of annoyance from the want of a moderately competent caravan bashi to see that our orders, which were never exacting, were duly carried out.- The men could not be trusted to do as they were told unless they were under constant supervision, and
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